Bodies and subjectivities: women in Cuban Paralympic sports (Cuerpos y subjetividades: mujeres en el deporte paralímpico cubano)

Abstract

Abstract The singularity of the other, based on González Rey’s subjectivity, opens up the possibility in Sports Psychology of exploring the topic of the female body configured within the subjective experience of participating in Paralympic high-performance sports. In this way, we can consider sports and body practices to be spaces of transgression, where subjectively produced sports experience translates into a form of affirmation of female participation. Using the constructive-interpretative method, the case study of an outstanding Cuban Paralympic high-performance female athlete facilitated the construction of alternative ways of producing knowledge based on singularity and empathic dialogue. The sport is built as a multidimensional field, which has continued to be a spectacle, where the reproduction of an aesthetic and behavioural pattern on the concept of ‘what a woman should be’ – beyond an aesthetically shaped body based on normality – has also been reinforced. The research carried out has allowed us to reflect on reinterpretation processes of the sports experience where the productions of the order of subjectivity are brought to life.